Please go into this matter as quickly as possible. It is
evident from the enclosed that the instruction of the Food
Commissariat (of the centre) puts these products at the
disposal of the Commission for Improving Scientists’
Living Conditions. Hence, without the consent of the centre,
Petrograd has no right to requisition them or take them
into account!

Notes

[1]Lenin wrote this note to the Narrow Council of People’s
Commissars on a letter from Maxim Gorky. In view of the fact that the
Petrograd Commune was proposing to requisition the products which
had been supplied by permission of the People’s Commissariat
for Food to the Petrograd Commission for Improving Scientists’
Living Conditions, Maxim Gorky, Chairman of the Commission,
asked the Council of People’s Commissars to pass a decision
stating: “Products supplied by gubernia food committees, with the
permission of the People’s Commissariat for Food, to the
Petrograd Commission for Improving Scientists’ Living Conditions
are not to be requisitioned by the Petrograd Commune nor to
be counted by the latter as part of the ration quota endorsed
by the Council of People’s Commissars, for Petrograd scientists.”
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p. 453